Image Credit: CFJC Today

By Chad Klassen

TOURISM ASSISTANCE

Tourism operators calling for more provincial funding as bleak winter awaits some businesses

Sep 24, 2020 | 5:17 PM

KAMLOOPS — Tourism operators like the Delta Hotel downtown have been hit hard this summer in the aftermath of COVID-19. After a temporary closure in March, they bounced back, but only up to 50 per cent occupancy.

“Going into the summer, we didn’t really know what to except,” said Delta Kamloops GM Bryan Pilbeam. “If you would’ve told me this the way it would’ve ended up, I would’ve thought that would’ve been okay. That said, we’re still about 50 per cent down of what we typically would be.”

The half-empty hotels have had ripple effects across the city. Tourism Kamloops, for one, is not receiving nearly the same dollars from accommodations revenues this year. It receives most of its annual funds from the Municipal and Regional District Tax (MRDT), which is added to anyone’s hotel stay and distributed by the province. As a result, Tourism Kamloops is down from the $1.6 million it typically receives every year.

“This year, we’re down about 30 to 40 per cent of that,” said CEO of Tourism Kamloops Bev DeSantis. “Also, the provincial government has allowed the accommodators to hold onto these monies until later on this year, so we haven’t seen any accommodation tax at all since March.”

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Tourism Kamloops and many of the operators it supports have been lobbying the government all summer for the proper funding, initially asking for $680 million. Earlier this month, the province provided $100 million for B.C. tourism operators.

Tourism Kamloops is thankful for the extension of the wage subsidy by the federal government to next summer, but it feels the province needs to do more for its second-largest industry.

“I think we need to see stimulus packages that will help businesses maintain staff and product throughout the winter,” said DeSantis. “We’ve seen a lot of closures. Whether those will be permanent, only the future will tell, but hopefully the government will support the task force that’s been put together. We’ll come up with some great recommendations to keep our industry moving in the trajectory that it was pre-COVID.”

Pilbeams notes $100 million won’t go far at all. For the hotel industry, there are real fears about multiple closures across the country heading into the winter months.

“All indications right now, for both the Hotel Association of Canada and certainly here in B.C., where we’re pretty strong but definitely impacted, about 30 per cent of all businesses are at risk of not making the winter right now,” said Pilbeam. “That’s a significant chunk. This is people’s livelihoods, family business.”